


Not As Dumb

by ribbons



Category: FAKE (Manga)
Genre: Community: springkink, Dubious Consent, Enemas, Fisting, Future Fic, Handcuffs, Invasion of Privacy, M/M, Stalker
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2010-04-26
Updated: 2010-04-26
Packaged: 2017-10-09 04:25:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 19,638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/83035
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ribbons/pseuds/ribbons
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ryo receives a peculiar present. Dee doesn't like it one bit.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the springkink community/fest at LiveJournal. Prompt: "ryo/dee: handcuffs, police business." Begun November 2008 and still in progress.
> 
> Please mind the kinks listed in the tags; there are extended explorations of consent and privacy issues, past/potential character deaths, and the like.
> 
> Timeline: Several years after _Like, Like, Love_. Includes references to first season extras and the second season episodes published in _HUG_ through 2008/04. This story assumes that the SCIU was dissolved after a couple years and the guys all got transferred back to the 27th -- both for convenience's sake and because the building depicted in various panels of LLL is of the 27th rather than the 52nd.

When the first pair of handcuffs slid out of the padded envelope addressed to him, Ryo immediately narrowed his eyes at Dee. He hadn't recognized the block printing on the label, but he still half-expected to see his lover suggestively smirking or openly grinning at him.

Instead, Dee turned white as a sheet and then fainted dead away.

Ryo lunged forward, pulling Dee away from the floor lamp he had nearly crashed into as he fell. Forcing training to override panic, Ryo swiftly checked Dee's airways and pulse and -- crap, there wasn't anything within reach for elevating the legs. _Circulation: Loosen any constricting clothing--_ Dee's collar was already open, and his sleeves rolled up, so Ryo busied himself with undoing Dee's belt. He'd just pulled its tip free of the buckle when Dee stirred.

"Whaa-- whoa." Dee croaked out. Confused green eyes tried to focus on worried black ones. "What the hell happened? I usually feel a _lot_ better than this when you're taking off my pants."

"I should hope so," Ryo said. "You usually don't faint at the sight of handcuffs, either."

"I don't-- oh. Oh shit. Those." Dee's indignation dissolved into dismay as he recalled the packet Ryo had opened. "Um, whadja do with them?"

Ryo waved vaguely toward the spot where he'd been standing, going through the mail. The handcuffs were on the floor nearby, their hard steel curves gleaming against weathered hardwood. They were a different model than the ones issued by the NYPD: the bracelets were connected by a thick black metal plate rather than a chain. From a distance, they resembled a distorted giant bottle opener.

[ ](http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/Lh4PbjWfRkG1C8YQyBx2DQ?authkey=vnRoqqNCwgU)  
---  
  
 

"Ah." Dee swallowed. "Um, yeah. Bit of a story there."

"Tell it," Ryo ordered. "I'm not letting you sit up until you do."

"Woe is me," Dee joked. "I'll just have to let you do all the work."

Ryo grinned in spite of himself. "I didn't hear you complaining the last time I did."

"Huh," Dee said. "Maybe I should faint more often."

Ryo's grin instantly vanished. "Don't you dare."

Dee's eyes widened. "Did _you_ just hit your head? You did _not_ just think I was serious."

"Uhm..." Ryo looked both sheepish and pained. "Cripes. I _do_ need a vacation, don't I."

Dee started to nod emphatically, but then winced -- he hadn't hit the floor hard, but it had caught him square on the side of his head. He settled for saying, "I've been telling you that for weeks. You oughta listen to me more."

"If I paid attention to half of the things you say, I'd never get anything done."

"That's not true. You'd be doing me more often--"

"Dee, you are so immature."

"I am _not_ imma-- why the fuck are you smiling?"

"You sound so _you_," Ryo said, his voice suffused with open relief. "Not like someone who was out cold a minute ago."

Dee smiled back. "Nope, nothing to worry about."

"I didn't say that. You _did_ faint, buddy." Ryo jerked his head toward the handcuffs. "Explain."

Dee scowled at the hoops, clearly wishing that they'd suddenly sink through the floor and disappear. When they failed to oblige him by doing so, he heaved a disappointed sigh.

Ryo tapped him on the nose. "The longer you stall, the more tempted I'm gonna be to cross-examine you."

"Jeez, Ryo, at least let me get in a few lies first." Dee aimed a last baleful glare at the handcuffs and then let his head fall back. "When I was a kid, there was a girl. Anna. Five, six years older than me, maybe? She worked at the orphanage for a couple of weeks. We were passing by a flea market, and there was a pair just like those. She claimed she knew some guy who'd pay good money for them, so I pinched them for her." Dee shrugged. "I didn't really believe her about the guy, but she was cute and I was bored."

Ryo rolled his eyes. "Didn't we collar some punk for something like that just last week? Thank God Bikky never wanted to impress anyone besides Carol."

"Carol wouldn't have been impressed by this. The guy I nicked the cuffs from, he was pretty out of it -- the way you tend to be, in fact."

"Brat." Annoyed, Ryo swatted at Dee, but Dee easily captured Ryo's hand before it could land on him. "So Anna was wildly impressed with your handcuff-stealing prowess?"

"She never did pay me, and she quit Mother's with no notice. Dude, you're ridiculous when you try to pretend you don't care." Dee chuckled as he blocked Ryo's other arm in mid-swing. "I'm jealous of everyone _you've_ ever had a crush on too, so I like it when you're this stupid. Just as long as you're not freezing me out."

Ryo gave up and stretched out over Dee, mumbling something that sounded suspiciously like "patronizing prick." Dee sighed happily, enjoying the warm weight of Ryo's body on top of his and his lover's grumpy nuzzling at his shoulder.

If only he could keep the creeps and lunatics away from his Ryo. Dee thought he'd gotten a break when Berkeley Rose had finally married Diana Spacey; Rose hadn't actually hit on Ryo in years, but the commish being at last on Freakella's leash had still delighted Dee beyond measure. Their engagement had coincided with JJ Adams's deciding to leave him the fuck alone for good and transferring all the deranged tackleglomping and demented shrieks of "SENPAI!!!" to Drake, who had actually _thrived_ as the target of the little maniac's adoration: in the course of dating JJ, Drake had become more physically fit and mentally agile than his friends had ever known him to be -- so much that it had surprised no one when he received his promotion to detective second grade the same year Ryo got graded up to first. Drake's transformation had started around the time that Bikky had left for college, which Dee had regarded as another gladsome milestone: fond as he'd become of the kid, Dee had been overjoyed at the prospect of more unadulterated adult-only Ryo-time up for grabs.

Looking back, Dee couldn't believe he'd been deluded enough to imagine their lives becoming less mayhem-ridden. There had been the tattoo artist who had kept sending them sketches that Ryo hadn't posed for -- lovingly rendered sketches in which he'd depicted his fantasies of a stark naked Ryo, wearing only the elaborate swirls of ink the man had longed to inscribe across Ryo's skin. There had been the cat hoarder who had secretly deposited a kitten in front of their apartment door every sixth day for three months -- and then tried to strangle Ryo with a knitted scarf when he'd admitted all of her intended love tokens had ended up at Animal Care &amp; Control (Dee still couldn't believe Ryo had tried to reason with the woman; it was true that their lease didn't allow pets, but Ryo had been _crazy_ to think that a crazy woman would have cared about that). There had been the oboe-playing freak who had repeatedly scaled up their building to serenade Ryo with off-key covers of Billy Joel songs; Dee would never forgive the guy for ruining "The Longest Time" for him, but he'd also laughed his ass off when JJ presented Ryo with a roll of toilet paper -- one with its sheets imprinted with the Piano Man's greatest hits.

There were also the people who hated Ryo because they hated cops, and then there were the people who _really_ hated Ryo because he was really good at being a cop. Dee had his own enemies, of course, but Ryo somehow had a knack for collecting adversaries motivated enough to seek revenge on him. Dee was no Einstein, but he was justifiably proud of his ability to outsmart and outmaneuver said adversaries, regularly putting them back out of commission before their attempts on Ryo could succeed; when _he_ got graded up to second, it had shocked the majority of his acquaintances and colleagues, but not the ones aware of his extended, exhaustive, and sometimes superhuman efforts to keep his partner healthy and whole. That the rest of society happened to benefit from his zeal was nice, but neither Rose nor Diana nor his friends at the 27th were under any illusions about its source: they all knew Dee was capable enough when he had someone specific to protect or rescue, such as a lost girl or a kidnapped boy or a threatened colleague, but whenever he detected danger specifically trying to sink its claws into his Ryo, Dee became not only dedicated but _driven_.

He usually had more to work with than handcuffs appearing out of nowhere, however. Tightening his arms around Ryo, Dee turned his head to glare at the mystery manacles.

"Is there anyone you can think of who might be trying to get at you through me?" Ryo's voice was deceptively calm. "Because, if there is, they had better think again before I run into them."

Dee said, "It wouldn't be Anna, if that's what you're wondering."

Ryo traced a scar on Dee's collarbone with his index finger. "You've kept track of her?"

"After she bailed on Mother, I forgot all about her -- didn't give her a thought for years. Not until my second month as a cop. Mikva and me, we answered a call about an apartment smelling nasty..."

Ryo quietly said, "Found her there, did you?"

"And the handcuffs too, around what was left of her wrists."

"Ever catch the perp?"

"No."

They fell silent again, each contemplating old memories and new unpleasant possibilities.

Eventually, Ryo suggested, "They might just be a prank."

"I'd really love to think that." Dee's expression was bleak.

"Then think that for now." Ryo slid his hands into Dee's. "No sense borrowing trouble ahead of time."

"What I think," Dee growled, "is that you're an insanity magnet."

"It's not my fault," Ryo protested. "It's not like I'm encouraging them."

"You're not," Dee conceded. "You don't have to. You're breathing, they're encouraged."

"Says the man who kissed me my second day on the job."

Dee didn't smile. "It's way more fun kissing you when you're into it," he said.

"Is it?" Ryo brushed his lips against Dee's, teasing.

Dee craned his head up to claim a real kiss. As Ryo pulled away, playfully delaying their mutual pleasure, Dee slid his fingers down to Ryo's wrists, holding them to the floor.

Ryo looked down at his captive hands, a thoughtful expression flickering across his face.

"You know, I've occasionally wondered why you've never tried to get me into handcuffs."

Dee stared at Ryo, his features creased with disbelief and consternation. "Is that really one of your fantasies? If it's something you want--"

"No, no," Ryo assured him. "Gear from work, in bed? Not arousing in the slightest."

"Oh, thank God for that," Dee breathed. "I'd do anything for you, Ryo -- even that -- but man, the sheer thought of it makes my skin crawl."

Watching Dee intently, Ryo slipped his right hand out of Dee's clasp and curled it over Dee's fingers, silently registering the panic and relief that flashed across his lover's face in quick succession -- so swiftly that he wouldn't have seen them at all, had he not long ago learned to look for them. He gently squeezed Dee's fingers.

"Hey," he murmured. "I don't need that kind of proof." He wriggled his hips against Dee's, his lips curving up as Dee's face instantly lit up with anticipation. "I should get back to taking off your pants, huh?"

"Hell _yes_." Dee punctuated his response by thrusting up against Ryo. Ryo laughed and pushed himself down to Dee's waist.


	2. Chapter 2

The second pair of handcuffs arrived two days later, in an envelope identical to the one used for the previous mailing. As before, the label was addressed to Ryo, but it was Dee who arrived home first from work that day. When he saw the packet, he didn't bother heading up to their apartment; instead, he snatched it up, sprinted out of the building, and hailed a cab straight back to the precinct station.

* * *

 

Ryo was squinting at the screen of his laptop when Ted poked his head through the doorway. "I'm calling in to Don and Joni's. You and Dee want anything?"

"Stromboli, for me." Ryo reached for his wallet and handed Ted a twenty. "Dee's not here -- he left at three."

Ted blinked. "He did? I just saw him ten minutes ago, terrorizing the new lab tech."

Ryo frowned. "That's...weird. We've got everything we need for the Subbarow case... Griaule's, that's open and shut... the Lomond murder, that's a total fiasco, but he knows that's not the lab's fault. He wouldn't be back here just for that..."

"Whatever it is, it's got him spitting nails," Ted said. "The tech wasn't getting in a single word edgewise."

"Just what I need," Ryo groaned. "Santiago on my tail."

Santiago was the head of the lab and fiercely protective of her subordinates. Ted's grin was both knowing and sympathetic. "She expecting you to keep Dee in line?"

Ryo cast a wary, weary glance at the telephone and pulled off his glasses. "I'll walk with you to DJ's, if you don't mind. She'll probably be on the horn any minute now, and I'm really not in the mood to explain _again_ that Dee is not my job."

"Damn right I'm not your job," Dee said, materializing at Ted's shoulder. "I'm _way_ more fun than a job."

"Modest, too," Ryo said drily.

"Modesty's a copout," Dee declared. "It's people who know what they want who get what they want."

Ryo opened his mouth to snap out a comeback, but no words came out: his mind had leaped back to the start of their partnership -- and to how fast and completely he'd fallen once he'd finally let himself want Dee with all his heart.

Ted hastily muttered, "I'll tell Don to make it two strombolis. See you guys in a while," and retreated down the hall.

Dee kicked the door shut, his eyes never leaving Ryo's face. They were blazing with a wild possessiveness that, once upon a time, Ryo would have found alarming.

These days, he found it hot beyond belief.

Closed door notwithstanding, though, they were at work. Ryo met Dee's stare with his own. "If the phone rings, it's yours."

"I'm off the clock."

"Then what the hell are you doing here?"

Dee disgustedly flung the new pair of handcuffs onto Ryo's desk. "So far, finding out diddly-squat."

Ryo winced as the metal clanged against the hard surface. "Dee, do you _mind_?" He scooped up the cuffs just before they skidded into his lap, holding them up for a closer look.

[ ](http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/h2DAhq4owTqS-_UI6CUxtg?authkey=vnRoqqNCwgU)  
---  
  
 

"Elegant," Ryo finally said.

"Not a damn print anywhere on 'em. Not a single stray fiber or speck inside the envelope or on its seal." Dee growled. "Some asshole is completely up to no good."

"I won't argue with that," Ryo said. "I wish you hadn't harassed the lab, though. It could have waited."

"Dude, once is creepy, twice is a threat."

"Not always," Ryo objected. "It could just be someone with a warped, overly subtle sense of humor. If I wanted to drive me crazy, I'd come up with something like this."

"No, you wouldn't," Dee retorted. "You'd be much more efficient about Operation Mortify Ryo. You'd get the packages sent to here, and you'd rig it so that they'd arrive artistically torn, so that _everyone_ would see them before you ever a chance to hide 'em. And they'd be covered in turquoise fur --"

"Dear God --"

"--with rhinestone studs and a 'Stairway to Heaven' soundchip in the keyhole--"

"Dee, how do you _know_ about handcuffs like -- no, wait, forget I asked. I don't actually want to know."

"Liar," Dee cheerfully said. "You adore me and you want to know everything."

Ryo set the handcuffs back down. "You're right, I do," he admitted. His lips twitched as he glimpsed the flare of delight in Dee's eyes; he found it both absurd and touching that he could make his partner so happy with such a simple acknowledgment.

It also secretly frightened him: it was not the kind of power he had ever wanted over anyone else. That Dee mattered to him more than anything was far less problematic: it was true that it had taken an inordinately long time and a talking-to from Diana for him to come to terms with his attraction to Dee, but he had never regretted finally crossing that Rubicon. Dee was brash, boisterous, and a hundred other things Ryo had never pictured himself finding tolerable -- never mind desirable -- in his pre-Dee fantasies of a romantic companion, and Dee's antics regularly complicated his life in too many ways to count, but there was also not a single shred of doubt in Ryo's mind that Dee was the best thing that had ever happened to him. It wasn't just the addictive bliss of soul-stealing kisses or the bone-melting gratification of great sex: it was how, with Dee, he _hadn't_ lost who he was, but become more himself rather than less. Dee seldom let him get away with the excuses or evasions he automatically resorted to whenever he tried to escape his memories or deny his feelings, whether they were about victims he couldn't save or his tendency to play the martyr whenever things weren't going his way. Dee was himself a casual, habitual liar where everyday convenience was concerned -- just the day before, Ryo had caught him blatantly fibbing about a dental appointment -- but he was heartstoppingly blunt when something or someone mattered enough to him, and being anything he thought Ryo truly needed clearly mattered above anything else.

Ryo compressed his lips, remembering how Dee had saved him from himself the night he'd pointed his gun at Leo Grant. How Dee had charged to his rescue during a trip to England. He recalled a night not long after Bikky had left for college, when he'd been jumped by a newly-released felon -- one who'd nursed a ferocious grudge against Ryo all through his stay in the hoosegow -- and how Dee had appeared on the scene within seconds, having chosen to stalk Ryo's stalker instead of heading home to sleep, which had been what he'd told Ryo he'd be doing. Ryo owed Dee his life several times over -- and it bugged him more than he cared to admit. The Japanese side of him was hugely resistant to carrying any sort of debt, and as much as he loved his Aunt Elena and Uncle Rick, there was a part of him that would always feel he should have been able to handle his parents' deaths on his own, even though he wouldn't have expected it of anyone else on earth. It was the part of him that steadily rebuilt his savings each time they were depleted by emergencies and other major expenditures, and it was the part of him that couldn't help wondering what in the world Dee saw in him that made him worth the trouble. Sure, Ryo cooked and cleaned more often than not, but Dee was no slouch at either when he felt like it, and there were plenty of other people he could have seduced into keeping house had that been his priority. Ryo had been stuck with more than his share of the paperwork throughout their partnership, but that had been his fate throughout grade school as well -- he'd been the smart, goody-goody kid repeatedly saddled with slackers and jokers on group projects, and they'd always taken his efforts for granted; Ryo didn't think Dee was any different from them in that regard, so that couldn't be the basis for Dee's enduring devotion. It certainly wasn't Ryo's ability to express affection -- Ryo didn't have it in him to be romantic or glib, and he sometimes feared that his lover would someday come to his senses and transfer his attentions to someone much more in sync with his style. Ryo knew Dee would never actually do that to him, but it nonetheless nagged at him at times like these: what had he done to deserve Dee's passionate commitment to him, and was he doing enough--

"You've gone quiet again," Dee said.

"I'm thinking of how impossible you're going to be until we sort this out," Ryo lightly said, gesturing to the handcuffs.

"_I'm_ impossible?" Dee snorted. "You're the one with the freakin' 'kiss me or kill me' vibe!"

"I -- I am not!" Ryo sputtered. "And even if I were, it doesn't mean it has anything to do with -- with whatever the heck these are about!"

"I will bet my left nut--"

"Could you please wager something not already on offer?" Ryo snapped. Then his cheeks turned crimson as he realized what he'd just said.

Dee burst out laughing. "You're right," he said, as he walked around to Ryo's side of the desk. "It's not a real bet when I _want_ you to take--"

"Dee, _we're at work_. Stuff your tongue back into your skull and--"

Dee licked the underside of Ryo's earlobe, and his hand snaked down to cup Ryo through his slacks. "I want you to do _this_ to me," he purred, his fingers pressing firmly against the fabric, seeking the curve of Ryo's balls.

"I'm not doing a damn thing to you other than chaining you to your desk," Ryo panted. His eyes were sparkling with both fury and arousal as he squirmed against Dee's hands and lips.

"If you insist," Dee crooned. "But only after I'm done with--"

"Dee, could you postpone molesting your partner until he's finished picking through my pics?" Alex Yoshizumi sauntered into the office, arms laden with carryout bags and a cardboard tray of soft drinks. He grinned as Ryo's desperate shove sent Dee sprawling onto the floor.

Dee glared at Alex. "Goddammit, whelp, didn't your elders ever teach you how to knock?"

The younger detective smirked as he set the food down on Dee's desk. "Of course they did, old man. I learned the not-knocking part from you."

"You reap what you sow," Ted intoned, walking in with his own dinner. "Serves you right for corrupting children, Dee."

Alex was in his second year at the precinct; he'd spent his first six months as Dee's partner, during Ryo's stint as a police academy instructor. He genially flipped Ted off as he said to Ryo, "Sorry to rush you, man, but O'Leary wants to go over my notes in an hour."

"Not a problem," Ryo said. He poked a button on his laptop and gestured at the reactivated screen. "I was looking at the last one when Dee dropped in. You can tell O'Leary I didn't see anything you didn't."

"Phooey," Alex said. "I mean, yay me for not missing anything, but I wanted to be done with this case. I was hoping the magic Maclean look-see would do the trick."

"I hate to break it to you, Alex, but you're probably actually getting better at your scene analyses. Clues don't just materialize because I'm the one looking."

"Oh, but they _do_," Alex claimed, grinning. "I learned that from your partner too."

"You see what I had to put up with?" Dee said to Ryo. "Never again."

"He's totally lying, kid," Ted said to Alex. "If Ryo skips back to teaching, that door so has your name on it."

"It wasn't horrible," Ryo said, "but I'd much rather be here. I'd only go back if I got hurt that bad again." He'd opted to become one of the academy's Social Science instructors during his recovery from a badly broken leg, choosing the novelty of preparing lectures over the known tedium of extended desk duty.

"If you ever go back, I'm going with you," Dee growled. "I'll get them to put me in Tactics or Gym."

"Ryo Maclean, you owe it to the public to stay healthy," Ted declared. "We can't let Dee near the recruits, the graduation rate's already at a record low."

"Graduation rate be damned," Dee said. "They're letting through too many morons as it is. The Lomond case is completely hosed because Darlington's a fucking _tool_ with his head so far up his ass he can't --"

"Dee, chill," Ryo commanded. "Don't ruin a good meal by bringing up Darlington."

"You really are a catty bitch," Alex said to Ryo.

Ryo coolly replied, "It's how I am. Deal with it."

"Hey, hey, I'm not disagreeing with you." Alex tossed the pickle spear that had come with his sandwich onto Dee's stromboli wrapper. "Darlington's pretty, but he's dumber than a bag of hair. There's no friggin' way he made detective without some sort of greasin' up --"

"Pipe _down_," Ted hissed, darting a glance toward the open door. "Darlington _does_ have friends here. Russell and Peckham are just down the hall."

Alex didn't lower his voice as he stated, "They're morons too. Someone's gonna get killed or maimed around that pack of clowns, and I hope to God I'm out of range when that happens."

Ted said, "You and Dee have spent way, way, _way_ too much time together."

"He was like that when we got him," Dee said. "Also, he's right. I don't trust those fuckwits any further than I can spit."

"I'm _so_ scared, Laytner," scoffed a supercilious voice from the doorway. "Though you're such a yokel, you probably spit like a champion."

"Want me to demonstrate, Russell?" Dee shot back.

"Save it for your Japanese boys," Russell sneered. "You must be good at bangin' them -- there's no other reason why they'd keep hauling your ass out of hot water."

"You son of a--" Alex barreled into Ted, who had swiftly stepped in front of him. Ryo had likewise gotten to his feet, ready to leap between Dee and the door if need be, but Dee had remained seated. He met the challenge in Ryo's stare with a slight shake of his head.

"Whipped," Russell taunted.

Dee ignored him, saying to Ryo, "Give me a little credit here. He's not worth me getting into trouble with you."

"So prissy little Maclean can kick your ass, huh?" Russell suggested.

"Stow it," Dee snarled. "Ryo's prettier than you'll ever be, but that's got nothing to do with your dick being smaller than a crayon."

Alex snickered. Ted sighed. Ryo muttered, "Oh, for crying out loud, I don't have time for this" as he sat back down and turned to his laptop.

Russell regarded Ryo with contempt. "Why don't you go back to the academy, then? You had plenty of time there to tattle on everyone you didn't like."

"My, my, aren't we quick with old gossip," Ryo calmly said, typing.

"You ruined a dozen careers with your power trips," Russell insisted.

"You flatter me."

"I bet you pull Star Cards from Laytner to get it up."

Ryo reached for the phone. "That's quite an imagination you've got, Russell. Care to share your major mental images with the Lou? I'm dialing his extension right now."

"You're such a fucking showoff," Russell snapped, but he'd vanished from the doorway by the time Lt. O'Leary's voice boomed, "Yes, Maclean?" through Ryo's handset.

"I've got a stromboli I'm not going to have time to eat," Ryo said. "You want Yoshizumi to bring it to you? No problem, sir, I'm glad it won't be going to waste. See you later, sir."

The room was dead silent as he hung up. Ted found his voice first. "So that's how to get first grade, huh? Cozying up to the commanders with food?"

Ryo shrugged. "It wouldn't kill you guys to be nice to them."

"But that was _your_ dinner," Dee pointed out. "What are you going to do for yourself now?"

Ryo closed the lid of his laptop. "I was thinking my partner could treat me to something. Since the real reason I won't be eating this is because I'm escorting him home."

Dee's face lit up. "Do I believe my ears? Sandra Dee Maclean about to play hooky?"

"I didn't say I wouldn't be working." Ryo tucked an overstuffed accordion folder under his arm as he stood up. "I'll get more done if Santiago doesn't catch me here."

"Yet more proof that Russell's a total loser. He ran away from you, and you're running away from a _girl_," Alex teased.

Ryo's smile was sharp. "I seem to recall someone begging me not to leave him with Nurse Emiry just last month, and it wasn't Dee."

Yoshizumi protested, "She doesn't count! She's built like a rhinoceros and twice as mean!"

Ryo's smile became even more needle-bright. "And do you remember what Diana Spacey had to say when you said that in her hearing?"

Yoshizumi blanched and held up his hands in surrender. "Fine, fine, I get it, I'm a loser too. But Russell's made of much more lose, and Darlington's the loser-est of them all."

Ryo lobbed the bag containing his DJ's order at the younger detective. "Take that to the Lou, please, and _lose_ the attitude already. We've still got to work with those guys."

Alex turned to Dee. "Does he ever _stop_?"

Dee trilled, "It's what I love about you Japanese boys, didn't you know? You're so sweet and soft and submissive and -- ow!" The book Ryo had hurled at him bounced off his shoulder as he doubled over laughing, and his hands clutched the bag Alex had pitched at his face.

Ted shook his head. "Ryo, I don't know about sending that lunch to O'Leary. It probably looks more like salad than stromboli by now."

"Then I guess the children will have to explain why, won't they?" Ryo already had a foot out the door. "Dee, I'll meet you out front when you're done. I'm gonna check in with Drake and JJ, see what they got from interrogating Tellerman."

"Ryo, wait up, I'll -- dammit." Dee slumped back into his chair as the sound of Ryo's footsteps receded down the hall.

Ted fished a receipt and a couple of bills out of a pocket and handed them to Dee. "I've said it before -- you're the craziest son of a bitch on the squad, but Ryo's even more 'work my own way' than you."

Dee grinned as he tossed the receipt into a wastecan and folded the bills into his wallet. "Am I hearing you say that Ryo is more obnoxious?"

"I'm saying he's more dangerous," Ted soberly answered. Dee and Alex looked at him in surprise, both taken aback at the tired anxiety coloring his words. "You and Yosh, you're bigger pains in the ass, but you're like that on purpose -- you've got your guard up and your guns cocked when you go around smacking people's buttons and yanking their chains. Ryo's more scary than either of you because half of the time he doesn't have a clue that he's pissing people off -- and the rest of the time, he does, but he doesn't take them seriously enough to realize how much he's pissed them off. He's so into whatever he's doing at any given moment that he totally fails to notice when he's cut off someone's dick because it happened to be in the way -- and then he gets blindsided by how they go all triple batshit on him because their asses got handed to them by someone who looks like a kindergarten teacher."

Dee's eyebrows had nearly climbed into his scalp during his colleague's tirade. "Ted, my friend, you're thinking yourself into a tizzy again --"

"My kindergarten teacher was much meaner than Ryo," Alex said, in a tone of cheerful nostalgia. "I've never forgiven her for confiscating my laser pointer."

"A laser -- what the _hell_ were you doing in preschool with _that_?" Dee demanded.

"Trying to impress the chicks," Alex admitted. "It was _school_, so I was bored out of my mind, so I nicked it from my mom's desk."

Ted's incredulous stare matched Dee's. "You were already after girls when you were _five_?"

"What can I say? I was a precocious little punk," Alex said, looking far too proud of that fact.

"Speaking of which, shouldn't you be legging this over to O'Leary's?" Dee threw the carryout sack back at the younger man.

Alex easily fielded the bag, wincing as he heard its contents rustle a little too loosely for comfort. "I'll just have to tell him I ran into Ted, and that's why it looks so bad."

Ted looked both amused and exasperated. "Why don't you pretend it's Russell in the doorway again, and I'll give you a few more bruises to show off?" A gleam appeared in his eye as he added, "In the old days, we could've just given JJ a call, and then positioned you right in front of Dee--"

Dee shuddered as he walked over to Ryo's desk. "Thank you, Lord, for mercies large and small /And bless all Thy creatures, the short and the tall..." The handcuffs jingled as he picked them up.

Alex automatically turned his head toward the sound as he headed toward the door. As he caught sight of the manacles, he stopped in his tracks, leaning toward Dee for a closer look. "Is that a pair of Adams handcuffs? What's Ryo doing with those?"

"Adams?" Dee narrowed his eyes. "These are JJ's?"

"I doubt that specific pair is his," Alex said, frowning at Dee's sudden intensity. "The pair I saw was in his guestroom, mounted in an antique shadowbox frame. Some uncle ten or fifteen 'great's back came up with the design."

Dee exhaled angrily. "So I've still got nada on these," he said, rattling the handcuffs.

"Ryo's already looked them over?" At Dee's nod, Alex continued, "He's slipping, man. First my pics and now your cuffs -- that's two sets of clues he's failed to coax out of thin air. The Maclean mojo is not in the house today. Did he forget to sacrifice a dozen sunflowers to the gods? Is there something we need to -- Ulp. Um, hi sir." He grinned weakly at Lieutenant O'Leary, who had silently appeared in the doorway.

"Is that my lunch that's mangled between your mitts, you mutt?" Alex immediately handed him the now sad-looking sack of food. O'Leary unrolled the top of the bag and peered into it with an air of resigned apprehension. Rolling it closed again, he thrust it at Alex and said, "Do me a favor -- go find a plate for this and put in the nuker for a couple minutes. And rinse the fork and the knife in the bag while you're there. I'll meet you back in my office in ten."

"Yes, _sir_!" O'Leary neatly stepped aside as Alex scurried out.

"And Russell's giving _me_ shit about my Japanese harem?" Dee said.

O'Leary coolly asked, "Are you planning to report him?"

"Hell, no. That'd waste my time more than his. All they'll do is make the guy take a class, and he'll still be an asshole once he's done with it."

"Then save your bitching for someone who cares," O'Leary said. "Which isn't me -- and right now isn't your partner, either. He's not real happy about Santiago storming into Parker and Adams's office to corner him there."

"Oh, _great_," Dee muttered. "That's my whole night down the drain. I'll be lucky if he's speaking to me again before breakfast."

The lieutenant leaned against the frame of the door, his arms folded. "Laytner, I seem to recall that you're not a moron, even though you keep acting like one. You yell at the labbies, they whine to Santiago. Santiago takes it out on Maclean, Maclean goes sub-zero on you. You _know_ by now that that's what's going to happen, so why the hell do you still do this to yourself?"

"Can I help it that Santiago can't save it for someone who cares?"

"If it's urgent enough to light fires under Santiago's crew, I ought to already know what it's about."

"If _I_ knew what the fuck was going on, I wouldn't need to lean on the damn lab," Dee countered. He held the handcuffs out to his superior. "Ryo's started receiving some jewelry in the mail. Sender unknown."

"A new secret admirer? Already?" O'Leary inspected the cuffs, scowling. "Parker just turned in the paperwork on the last one." He turned a gimlet glare upon Ted. "And what are _you_ finding so funny?"

Ted gamely admitted, "It's how you said 'Already,' sir. It reminded me of Ryo's reaction the time you told him he was catnip for kooks."

"Well, he _is_," O'Leary irritably grunted, but a corner of his mouth had twitched upward. "Present company not excepted."

"Present company doesn't give a flying fuck what you call it," Dee snapped. "All the other kooks need to take a hike. Preferably off the Tappan Zee."

"I'm sure the feeling's mutual," the lieutenant said, handing the cuffs back to Dee. "I know you've got nine lives, Laytner, but try not to get baited into wasting any of them while you're watching out for Maclean. We don't have the budget or the time to fish either of you out of the Hudson." He turned to Ted again. "Consider yourself Laytner's backup for this."

Dee bristled. "I don't need a babysitter."

"Funny you should say that." O'Leary allowed himself a sardonic smile. "You sound just like Maclean when he thinks you're hovering. Later, gentlemen."

"I do not hover!" Dee yelled down the hall.

"The hell you don't!" a boyish voice shouted back.

"Like you're one to talk, JJ!" Dee bellowed, hastily retreating back into the office. His attempt to slam the door collided with 130 pounds of flying sharpshooter, its panels and hinges rattling dangerously. JJ merrily picked himself up off the floor and dusted off his clothes before looking over at Dee, who had taken refuge behind Ryo's desk.

"I should start doing more of that again," JJ said, his eyes alight with wicked glee. "That was way more fun than what my trainer put me through this morning."

"I'll put you through this window if you do," Dee threatened. "Then Drake will kill me for killing you, and O'Leary _won't_ kill Drake, but he'll make him mentor our replacements, and _that_ will make Drake wish O'Leary had simply killed him after all, so he'll go get blind drunk and then piss on your grave, and you wouldn't want that, would you?"

Ted said, "You're missing a step. Ryo would kill Drake before the Lou got around to it."

Dee shook his head. "No, Ryo wouldn't go that far."

"For you, he would," JJ countered.

"No," Dee reiterated. "Trust me on this. Killing for revenge is a line Ryo won't ever cross."

He thought he had been doing a good job of keeping his voice matter-of-fact, but Ted and JJ exchanged a startled look. _Shit_. But before Dee could come up with something to steer the topic elsewhere, Ted mused aloud, "He's been stuck with you what, ten, eleven years? And you're both still alive..."

JJ snickered. Dee gritted out, "Just what are you getting at?"

"You're a psycho and a pest," Ted flatly stated. "If Ryo ever does shoot you, all he'll have to do is plead temporary sanity and the jury will find for him."

"And O'Leary appointed _you_ as my nanny? I feel so reassured."

"O'Leary what?" JJ looked bemused but unsurprised. "Oh, Dee, what did you do now?"

"Time for a coffee break," Ted said, forestalling Dee's response. "Let's head over to Ninth Street. Dee's gonna bring us up to date on Ryo's latest set of love tokens, and after that, he can bring back a latte to calm his darling down."

"We can skip the walk," Dee growled. "There's nothing to tell, and Ryo'll just dump the drink over my head."

"Ryo would not," JJ said. "Too messy. Though Santiago was really shrill today -- he might be pissed off enough not to care. Especially if he's hit that mood where he wants an excuse to stay snippy with you."

Ted had been studying Dee while JJ talked. "Something about this is freaking you out more than usual," he said. "You'd normally be all over any scrap of a clue, no matter how random it might seem. Either this isn't really about Ryo, or you're getting as dumb as you are loud."

Dee hotly flung back, "Maybe I just don't wanna discuss stalkers around someone who stalked _me_."

A sudden hush fell among the three detectives. At Dee's words, JJ's eyes had instantly brimmed with tears, but he furiously blinked them back as he said, "Whatever you want, Dee. I'll just go back to work, and Drake can --"

"No, JJ, we need you on this one. You're the one who's our resident expert on these," Ted cut in, extricating the Adams cuffs from Dee's unresisting grasp.

"What the..." JJ automatically accepted the cuffs from Ted, his demeanor shifting from "hurt" to "professional" as if someone had flipped a switch. "Did they come with a key?"

"No," Dee rasped out, not quite looking at JJ.

"Polished steel... 1862 patent stamp... I saw a pair of these listed at 300 bucks in a catalog not too long ago. That was for mint condition, though, with a reproduction key... You bullied the lab into taking glamour shots of these, right? E-mail them to me, I'll start asking around -- my Aunt Abby's the historian in the family, she follows most of the collecting gossip and she'll have heard if there's a pair of these gone AWOL. Do you have photos of the other stuff Ryo's received?" At Dee's shake of his head, JJ tsked. "Ted's right, you _are_ off your game. Don't go hassling the lab again -- Ted can take care of it."

Dee nodded in agreement: Ted had long ago proven he was ahead of the rest of them when it came to all things related to computers; he had a knack for selecting the best settings on any digital camera he got his hands on, such that even his basic, no-frills, off-the-cuff snapshots looked miles better than anything anyone else in their circle could usually manage. Dee ran a hand through his hair and then reached for his pack of cigarettes. "Let's go," he said. "JJ, you wanna pick up Drake and meet us out front?"

"No, I've got stuff I need to get back to," JJ said, his voice even. "You guys take Drake along and bring back a Coke for me when you're done."

"10-4," Dee briskly said, and headed out the door. Ted trailed behind him, pausing to look at JJ with open concern.

"It's okay," JJ reassured him. "Honest. Shoo!" Ted's expression lightened into an answering smile and he hurried out after Dee.

As the footsteps of his colleagues receded down the hall, JJ's smile faded. He stepped over to Ryo's desk and quickly shuffled through the second stack of folders from its right edge, easily locating the one on Tellerman's aunt that Ryo had advised him to retrieve. His original mission completed, JJ lingered in front of the desk, surveying Ryo's neat row of sticky-notes, the magnets clinging to the side of the file cabinet, and the easel-style desk calendar from the NYPD union; from a previous snoop-around, JJ happened to know that a snapshot of Dee, Bikky, and Carol was tucked securely inside the calendar, behind the panel for "December."

JJ sighed sadly, knowing he was about to succumb once more to one of his most private, guiltiest compulsions: periodically prowling through the contents of Ryo's desk. It was a habit he had first indulged in soon after the episode where he'd spied Dee planting a kiss on Ryo at the shooting range: he'd wanted so desperately to figure out what on earth Ryo possessed that Dee found so irresistible, and analyzing Ryo's belongings in-depth had seemed as good a way as any to cater to his mind's insistence on dwelling upon everything to do with Dee. After a while, it had become less about the hope for answers and more about the fun of getting away with it: Ryo was notorious for his uber-neat, order-loving ways, but he was also legendarily, astoundingly lax about keeping tabs on his belongings. JJ hadn't personally believed the yarn that had buzzed around for a while about Ryo's foster son, Ryo's stun gun, and a bear, but he'd witnessed Ryo misplacing coffeemugs, making return trips for jackets left behind, and even spacing out completely on dates with Dee (the last fortunately far less frequent than his other lapses of attention). JJ had relished "borrowing" small items from Ryo from time to time, and returning them a few days later with Ryo apparently none the wiser. It wasn't that stealing from Ryo had presented any particular challenge -- Drake and Dee and Ted themselves all regularly raided Ryo's desk for spare change and snacks -- but, for JJ, each instance of illicit possession had nonetheless felt like a tiny triumph: learning so much about Ryo, however trivial or tangential, had allowed him to feel as though he was uniquely and intimately connected to Ryo's life -- which, by extension, had let him persuade himself that he was uniquely and intimately connected to Dee as well.

There was only so much self-delusion even he could stomach, however, and he'd finally reached his limit right around the time Ryo moved in with Dee. He had attended a brunch where he'd blithely remarked to a friend how So-and-So needed to realize she was no longer as cute as she thought she was, and the friend had bluntly replied, "Takes one to know one -- you're not getting any younger yourself." The casually cruel remark had suddenly jolted him into truly seeing his behavior from Dee and Ryo's perspectives: he had been so intent on being adoring, adorable, and memorable that he hadn't been able to recognize -- much less accept -- that those very same actions had come across to Dee for more than a decade as creepy and tiresome. For the first time in his life, he had assessed his own actions from the vantage point of someone neutral -- the same stance he generally maintained toward the rest of his detective work, but which he hadn't previously thought to apply toward his unrequited attraction to Dee -- and what he'd seen had made him wish he'd possessed some sort of magical eraser for all his interactions with Dee since their academy days. It was humiliating to realize that Dee and Ryo would never see him without the baggage of a thousand unrequited passes, and that it was all his own doing -- it wasn't as though Dee hadn't conveyed his dismay and frustration at the persistence and intensity of JJ's affection each time JJ had attempted to vault through Dee's resistance.

JJ smiled faintly to himself as he gazed at Ryo's desk, his mind darting among various highlights in his relationships with Dee, Ryo, and Drake. The past couldn't be wholly forgotten, but it could pushed firmly into the background by one's present behavior, and he was so clearly _good_ for Drake -- in a way he'd never managed to be for Dee -- that it did _him_ good: to have his natural inclination to fuss and to fawn be rewarded with appreciation rather than contempt was a heady feeling he never wanted to lose. Directing it at Drake instead of Dee had also significantly improved his level of camaraderie with both Dee and Ryo: Dee no longer actively avoided him, and seemed less prone to using JJ as a target for his periodic, outsized outbursts of rage. Ryo remained polite and cool and hard to read, but JJ nonetheless fancied that his former rival had incrementally thawed towards him: regularly-getting-laid-Ryo seemed much more able to take a joke, and was even occasionally willing to dish back what he got, judging from the thoroughness with which JJ and Drake's office had gotten swathed with the Billy Joel toilet paper.

So yes, things had worked out for the best, in general. But there were still some ugly moments among all of them: there was Dee being Dee and thus incurably rude, especially when he felt tense or threatened. There was Ryo being Ryo, who was seldom rude on purpose but who sometimes managed to offend people out of sheer goody-two-shoed cluelessness. There was Drake being a terminal slob, inadvertently inflicting cigarette burns and coffee stains upon JJ's clothes and other belongings. There was Ted being a chronic worrywart: his tendency to dwell upon every potential angle to a situation was one of his strengths as a detective, and it helped make him a whiz at debugging anything technology-related, but it also sometimes paralyzed him when he needed simply to plow ahead with a plan. There was Alex Yoshizumi, who was as brash as Dee and as hardworking as Ryo -- working with him sometimes felt like being trapped with a profane Energizer bunny.

And there was JJ being himself, which meant he tended to say too much and feel too much, and to remind people of the very things he wanted them to forgive and forget for the sake of a quick quip or a moment's laugh. It meant that he constantly craved the pleasure of being memorable: his dyed hair, his superlative sharpshooting skills, and his strident pursuit of Dee were all facets of the same insatiable hunger for attention. And it meant that even though he was largely content with his current relationship, he still sometimes fell prey to the urge to collect all the information he could about his old crushes, former boyfriends, and in Ryo's case, onetime rival.

He no longer permitted himself to take anything from Ryo's desk without Ryo's express permission -- the chances of getting caught were exponentially higher now that Drake had unlimited access to JJ's own belongings, and the increasingly diminished sense of power he'd once extracted out of possessing Ryo's possessions (however temporarily and no matter how trivial) was not worth the potential fallout. Nevertheless, it was an addiction that JJ couldn't completely shake. Learning about every case Ryo was working on somehow made JJ feel like he was supporting Ryo's successes, even when he wasn't directly involved with the investigations in question, and no matter how sternly he chastised himself on the sheer absence of logic in that particular emotional equation. Retrieving Ryo's spare glasses or vial of prescription antacids was not a task JJ was ever likely to receive, but he still liked the fact that he knew where Ryo stored such things. It had let him glimpse snapshots of Dee that Ryo had never shared publicly -- all technically work-safe, but still unmistakably photos taken by a lover rather than a mere friend.

As he rifled through Ryo's in-tray, JJ wasn't expecting much in the way of surprises. He recognized some of its contents as memos and junk mail he hadn't gotten around to sifting out of his own in-box. There was paperwork for three new cases and two ongoing inquiries, an envelope from the Property Clerk Division, a receipt from one of the dispatchers who'd apparently sold to Ryo three pies (one cherry, one pecan, one pumpkin) on behalf of her daughter's band, and -- _hel-**lo**_, JJ thought, as a fat, unmarked file practically flipped itself open.. _What in the world?_

He stared at the file and its contents for a long, long time, and finally let out a low, disbelieving whistle. "Brilliant of you, Ryo. Storing it in the one place on your desk where Dee would never look..." He pulled his cellphone out of his vest and punched Ryo's speed-dial code. When the other detective picked up, he said, "It's JJ. Your instructions were fine, I found the file right away. ...Never mind that for now, I have a different question you need to answer."

"Sure, JJ. What's come up?"

JJ hauled in a deep breath before continuing, all too aware of what he himself was about to reveal. "That's quite a collection of threats you've received from Darlington's brother. Were you planning to tell Dee about them sometime this century?"


	3. Chapter 3

"Ack! What the _fuck_!?" Ryo glared at the remains of the medium-sized Coke he had nimbly dodged a second before. The cup of liquid now spattered across the sidewalk had been hurled from a car speeding by.

A man seated by a nearby display of produce grumbled, "Stupid kids. Someone's gonna get hurt one of these days. Can't think why the cops haven't locked them up yet."

Ryo forced himself simply to walk on, quelling the sudden, savage urge both to kick the cup and snarl at the man. He had remained at the precinct until the end of his shift after all. Only a few hours had elapsed since JJ's phone call, but Ryo felt as if he'd careened through a week's worth of emotions since their conversation. What he wanted now, more than anything, was to get home to Dee.

As he approached their apartment building, he saw his lover hunched by the half-moon window overlooking the street. When he reached their living room, he also glimpsed the overflowing ashtray at Dee's feet. Before Ryo could finish closing the door behind him, Dee burst out with, "I'm not gonna say 'I'm sorry' for watching your back."

A corner of Ryo's mouth twitched. "Been sitting on that all evening, huh?"

"Goddammit, Ryo, don't patronize me."

"Didn't mean to," Ryo said. He walked up and wrapped his arms around Dee. "In fact, I have a favor to ask."

"Yeah?"

Ryo pulled his handcuffs out of their case and held them towards Dee. "I want you to cuff me and take me," he calmly stated.

Dee stared at Ryo, speechless at the direct request. His fingers convulsed by his side; Ryo braced himself for a slap.

Dee finally managed, "You can't be serious."

"I swear I'm not kidding." Ryo held Dee's stare.

"You're _that_ pissed off? Did you really spend your whole evening thinking up how to get back at me?"

"I'm not mad at all. At least, not at you." Ryo seized Dee's arm before Dee could storm past him. "You're the only one who can do this for me, you idiot."

That stopped Dee in his tracks. "You said it wasn't a turn-on. Were you lying?"

"It's not," Ryo insisted. "Though, if anyone could turn it into a turn-on for me, it'd be you."

Dee searched Ryo's face, which was pale and set. Early in their partnership, he had accused Ryo of having a split personality, and the way Ryo thoroughly compartmentalized sexual matters continued to astound him: Ryo habitually reacted to personal queries with blushing and stammering evasions, but he was generally unfazable when it came to coping with the NC-17 aspects of their cases. Obtaining statements from whores, reviewing the inventories of erotica boutiques, examining evidence contaminated with assorted secretions -- when Ryo handled such chores, he maintained a professional objectivity that Dee tended to find both impressive and maddening.

Given that they were off duty, "maddening" was winning out. As Dee fought down the urge to smack his partner, Alex Yoshizumi's "Does he ever _stop_?" echoed through his mind. "Can't you just chain yourself to a dummy and ride it 'til you're done?" he snarled.

Ryo quipped, "Our friends would say I'm already chained to a dummy."

"I'm not joking, Ryo. Don't use me like this, I'm not your fucking homework --"

"And I'm not yours." Ryo's voice was low and furious. "If you're going to use me as your excuse to bully the techs, then you can damn well help me practice keeping my cool when someone gets the jump on me."

"By roleplaying a rapist?" Dee spat out, incredulous. "You think I'm going to let anyone get you that way?"

"Dee, get real. You can't cover my back 24-7 --"

"I can damn well try --"

"And someday our luck's not gonna hold --"

"Over my dead body --"

"You jerk!" Ryo yelled. "That's exactly what I don't want to happen!"

Dee froze, stunned by Ryo's passionate declaration. Then he shook Ryo's hand off his arm -- the better to haul his partner close.

"Spill," he demanded. "What the fuck happened today?"

"Nothing new," Ryo said angrily. "Two pairs of unsolicited handcuffs not enough for you?"

"Don't distract me," Dee shot back. "Something's scared you, and now you want sex to make you forget about it."

Ryo jangled his cuffs. "If I wanted to shove it aside, would I ask you to use these?"

Dee blanched at the sound of metal on metal. "You're a sick bastard, Ryo. Why would you even need to practice something like this? If someone tries to cuff you, kill them. If someone actually manages to cuff you, I'll kill them as soon as I get there. If that someone also gets into your pants, I won't just kill them, I'll serve their nuts to the rats in Central Park."

Ryo shook the cuffs again. "If someone tries to cuff me, of course I'll try to fight them off. But if someone actually does cuff me, I don't want to freak out if I can help it. And if our luck runs out and you don't get there before -- before something nasty goes down -- wh-whatever happens, I don't fucking want them to be m-my first in that way." For the past couple of hours, Ryo had rehearsed in his head how he was going to answer Dee's objections without giving away Ronnie Darlington's threats or JJ's discovery of them. He was proud of how he'd managed to handle Dee so far, but it was starting to take its toll: even as he willed himself to stay calm, he could hear his voice tremble and sense the tears forming in the corners of his eyes. And Dee would turn tender on him --

"Oh, shit. _Ryo_\--" Dee sat down heavily on the windowseat, pulling Ryo down with him. Ryo felt Dee's warm, beloved lips lapping up the moisture that had leaked onto his cheeks. Felt Dee's broad hands cradling his face; Dee's long legs wrapping around his own. Felt himself start to melt --

Ryo wrenched his focus back to the favor he'd asked. "I don't expect you to rape me," he quietly said. "I don't expect you to pretend-rape me, either." Dee stiffened at the words, but said nothing. Ryo continued, "I -- I just want to be prepared as I can for the worst. And if you take me now, then that's something I'll be able to hold onto -- it'll be something they can't use against me, because you'll have already done it to me, and it won't be something they can possibly do better than you, so their gloating won't get to me, because it won't be true--"

"Jesus Christ on a pole." Dee's voice rang with pained disbelief. "You did not come up with all that just today. How long have you been torturing yourself with what-might-be's?"

"Since you fainted when the first pair of handcuffs arrived." Ryo sat up, swiping away the last of the tears with his sleeve. He locked eyes with Dee, his voice low and dangerous once more. "About Anna -- what you told me before -- what were you leaving out? There had to be more, for it to knock you flat on your ass like that."

Dee flushed. "You're getting too good."

"I learned from the best."

Dee shook his head. "It doesn't take superpowers to pick up when you're being less than truthful."

"If that's true," Ryo said, "how is that only you and Diana ever call me on it?"

"Dude, Jim Campbell read you like a book the first time he met you."

Ryo made an exasperated noise and planted his hands on Dee's shoulders. "Do I need to invite Jim over, or are you going to get around to telling me what you don't want me to know about Anna?"

Dee muttered, "It'd be easier to explain it to Jim than to you."

"Fine." Ryo released Dee with a shove and stalked across the room.

Dee scrambled after him. "Where the hell do you think you're going?"

Ryo reached for the telephone. "Since you'd rather talk to Jim instead of me --"

"No, no, _no_. Goddammit, it's not that at all! It's just that I know you, and you're not going to take it well when you find out Anna looked like you!"

Ryo froze. Dee clapped a hand over his mouth as his brain belatedly registered what he'd blurted out.

Ryo placed the receiver back into its cradle with unnatural precision. His face even more pale than before, he walked back to the half-moon window. He moved two of the oversize cushions to the floor with the same, unnervingly deliberate care he'd used with the telephone handset. Then he knelt on the broad sill, staring down at the street.

Dee seated himself next to Ryo, his eyes fixed on his partner and his hands clenched.

Five, ten, fifteen cars crawled past their building before Ryo spoke. "Traffic isn't usually this jammed up on this block this time of night. Something must be wrong further up the street."

"It could be just some event letting out," Dee suggested. "Doesn't have to be something bad."

"It doesn't," Ryo conceded. He ran a finger along the diagonal edge of a windowpane. "I should try thinking that way about your former paramours, I suppose. They don't have anything to do with me other than sheer coincidence, right?"

"I've been telling you that for years," Dee said. "_Now_ you're coming around to believing me?"

"Not really." Ryo admitted, his voice brittle. "The first time you kissed me -- were you thinking of Anna then?"

"Not one bit," Dee insisted. "And none of the other times, either. I honestly hadn't thought of her in years."

"I wasn't some stupid way of getting her at last? Or somehow getting back at her?"

Dee gritted his teeth. "You and she had nothing in common. Just a superficial physical resemblance. And maybe how you both weren't above using kids to do your dirty work."

"I never --"

"All those times you yelled for Bikky when you weren't ready?"

Ryo shut his mouth and shrank back into his corner of the windowseat, hugging his knees.

"Hey." His expression softening, Dee leaned towards Ryo, daring to place a hand on top of Ryo's right foot. "I didn't say that to guilt-trip you."

Ryo tightly said, "I know. But I still feel bad about it."

"What you _should_ feel bad about is how ready you are to think the worst of me." Dee firmly pressed his right hand against Ryo's jaw, forcing the other man to meet his eyes. "There's no one else for me, dumbass. It's been you and only you, from the moment you showed up at the Badger's office."

"It so was not. You were just trying to get my goat, at the start."

"Another way you and Anna aren't alike," Dee said. "That girl was anything but uptight." His hands dropped away from Ryo as he turned his own gaze to the roof across the street. "It's probably why she's dead, too."

"Glad you aren't into that type," Ryo muttered.

Dee visibly flinched. Ryo hastily said, "Sorry, that was super-tasteless of me."

"Hah. It's something the guys would expect _me_ to say." Dee rested his forehead against the windowpane. "Remember how JJ and Drake automatically blamed me when you TP'd their office?"

Ryo couldn't help smiling. "It's my bonus for putting up with you. Being your partner means I can _almost_ get away with murder."

Dee didn't look up. "No 'almost' about it," he softly said. "If that's what you end up having to do--"

"It'll be self-defense, if it gets to that point," Ryo reminded him, frowning. "It's not like you to forget that, Dee."

"Funny," Dee said mirthlessly. "Ted was saying the same thing earlier today. And JJ agreed with him. Said my game was off."

Ryo's frown deepened. "_That_ is not like JJ. You running a fever?" He moved behind Dee, pulling his partner back so he could slide a hand onto Dee's forehead.

"I wish," Dee muttered. "The flu, I know how to deal with."

"Hmm. You don't _feel_ off to me," Ryo said, dropping his hand to Dee's shoulder. "But something's definitely wrong when even JJ… Maybe we should take that vacation now?"

"Unbelievable." Dee pressed his own hand to his forehead. "Weeks and weeks of telling you to take time off, and getting nowhere, and _now_ you're willing?"

Ryo shrugged. "You're always trying to lure me away from work. That's par for the course. Me and JJ being on the same page is way more disturbing. I don't like that at all."

"Man, you sure know how to hold a grudge," Dee said. A beat later, he added, "It's so cute when you go all possessive."

"Bite me." Ryo lightly socked Dee in the shoulder. "So. Maybe it's time we tried England again?"

Dee shuddered violently. "God, no. Bad enough seeing ghosts here --"

"What!? Dee, there are no such things as --"

"I know you don't think so, but I saw what I saw! Anna showed up next to you when you pulled out those goddamn cuffs! And that's when I realized how much she looked like you --" Dee choked on the words, and his face was chalk white as he continued, "She was wearing the friggin' cuffs, her shirt was soaked with blood --"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Whoa, buddy. Easy…" Ryo eased them both into lying down, lightly sandwiching Dee between the seat-cushion and himself. "No wonder you went into shock. You take things so hard, Dee. There's nothing you could've --"

"You moron, it's not about her at all," Dee bellowed. "It's seeing what you'd look like if you got yourself killed!"

Annoyed, Ryo gave Dee a hard shake. "For God's sake, get a grip. I'm not a girl, and I'm not about to let anyone turn me into a figment of your imagination."

"You haven't believed a word I've said, have you. Damn it, Ryo --"

"I believe that you believe you saw Anna's ghost."

Dee's expression turned sulky. "Now you're just humoring me."

"A bit," Ryo admitted. He reached for his handcuffs once more and slapped them into Dee's palm. "And now I'm not."

"Ryo --"

"We are going to practice," Ryo informed Dee, "because I have got to know that you can keep your shit together even if something bad goes down. There's too much going on -- I can't afford any extra distractions, and you've got me dead worried about you going out of your head if you see me cuffed or chained. Or worse." He nailed Dee with a point-blank stare as he added, "I like to think I'll still be me no matter what happens -- even if I end up as, ah, 'damaged goods' -- but you're not convincing me _you_ can handle it."

"You cold, conniving son of bitch," Dee breathed. "Do I need to buy you a ring and swear 'for better or worse' in front of a judge?"

"Like that guarantees anything," Ryo retorted.

"As God is my witness, you will never get rid of me. Even if I get stuck cleaning out your colostomy bags or changing your Depends because you can't stay out of trouble."

Ryo shuddered. "Believe me, I hope it never comes to that. If it gets to that point, I'll seriously consider shooting myself."

"Don't you dare," Dee said, outraged. "Don't you ever even fucking _think_ of leaving me like that."

Ryo softly said, "What if I someday get hurt so bad we can never have sex again? What if I permanently lose control of my hands, or my gut, or if my brain gets too scrambled to remember your name or who you are? What happens when I become flabby and decrepit, if we're lucky enough to live that long? Would you really, truly want to be saddled with any of that?"

"Are you saying you're going to dump my ass if any of those things happen to me?"

"No!" Ryo looked both insulted and horrified. "Of course I wouldn't!"

"If I begged you to shoot me -- to let me stop being a burden to you -- would you?"

"Jesus, no! I'd take care of you no matter what! After I got done smacking you to Queens and back for thinking I wouldn't want to!"

"Then, for the love of God, give me the same damn credit!" Dee roared. "If it was just about sex and hearts and flowers, you wouldn't be worth what you put me through!"

"I could say the same of you!" Ryo shouted back. "Loving you is already a complete pain in my ass!"

An evil glint appeared in Dee's eyes. "Why, Ryo, if you haven't gotten used to man-on-man by now, we need to be having _much_ more sex."

Ryo tapped the handcuffs, an answering glint in his eyes. "I'm willing to get to work if you are. And don't give me that crap about how you don't mix work and play -- I can't even begin to count all the times you've tried to pounce me in the office just this week."

Dee grimaced and turned his head, casting his gaze around the apartment. Combining his digs with his former neighbor's had been one of the smartest moves he'd ever come up with. Ryo could be generous to a fault -- look at all he'd done for Bikky and for Carol, just for starters -- but he also had the weirdest territorial issues of anyone Dee had ever met, and they tended to surface whenever he was confronted with something new, even when the something new was something Ryo actually wanted. During their second night as lovers -- their first in Ryo's former apartment -- Dee had offered to fetch some water for them both, but instead of responding with gratitude, Ryo had bitched at Dee for usurping the role of the host. On the eve of their joining the SCIU, Ryo had made a point of making Dee ask to stay the night -- a formality he had also demanded whenever a vacation or conference was imminent, as well as on the night of Carol's high school graduation, and sometimes prior to replacing a major appliance or furnishing.

_My adorable, insane, infuriating control freak,_ Dee thought fondly. He hadn't intended to wait six years before bringing up the subject of living together, but every time he'd worked up the nerve to raise the possibility, something or someone had set off one of Ryo's myriad, mystifying triggers over boundaries. Dragging Ryo out of his comfort zones was often fun and sometimes simply necessary, but Dee himself hadn't been sure that co-habitation would be the right move for them: after years at the orphanage, and then in the scuzzy, overcrowded dives he'd shared with his academy classmates, Dee had loved having a bedroom and a bathroom that were all his, and his alone. He had relished the freedom of _not_ having to put his things away each time he used them, and Ryo had grudgingly tolerated the habit both as a host and as a guest, but Dee had not been able to delude himself about the potential for disaster: to live together would escalate their mutual impatience with each other's hang-ups, and he'd seen the ugly aftermath of twenty-year marriages imploding over differences as petty as the proper way to squeeze toothpaste out of a tube.

So it had been a godsend, being able to add a second bathroom and two more bedrooms to his flat. They usually slept in Ryo's bedroom, but there was a separate room designated as Dee's, where he happily left his magazines, newspapers, clothes, beverage containers, and other clutter strewn about for weeks on end. Ryo left that room and "Dee's bathroom" completely out of his cleaning routines, and Dee returned the favor by respecting the other bathroom's status as a Ryo-only zone: it doubled as the guest bathroom when they had company, but the rest of the time, it was Ryo's exclusive space, to where he retreated when he wanted to sulk or brood -- and when he wanted to clean himself out before having sex, which was his preference whenever he could hold off Dee and his own hormones long enough to do so.

Dee's gaze flew back to Ryo, an idea blossoming in his mind that both repelled and frightened him. He curled his fingers around a cuff and stared hard into Ryo's eyes. "If I do what you say you want, are you _sure_ you aren't going to hold it against me?

"Cross my heart," Ryo began. Dee pressed his fingers to Ryo's lips before he could continue.

"Don't say the rest," Dee whispered. He replaced his fingers with his mouth as he unknotted Ryo's tie and proceeded to undo the buttons of his shirt.

"Ngghhhhmmmm," Ryo sighed, closing his eyes in pleasure as the kisses clouded his senses. He obligingly slipped his arms out of the shirt as Dee tugged at its sleeves.

"Ryo." The tension in Dee's voice jolted him back to full awareness, as did the sensation of cool metal against his bare skin: Dee was slowly running the handcuffs up and down Ryo's right bicep, watching his partner closely. "Ryo, I will do this for you, but the instant you tell me to stop, we're stopping."

Ryo's chin rose. "No, let's do this right. No stopping unless I actually say 'pantyhose.'"

"No matter what?" Dee sounded even more tense than before. "What if I come up with something that you _would_ consider a violation?"

Ryo didn't look away. "I asked for this," he said, his voice even. "Do your worst. Though you get to do the explaining if you're about to invite someone to watch or help."

Dee recoiled at the very thought. "_Fuck_. That never crossed my mind. And hell will freeze over before I share you like that."

Ryo shrugged. "That's what I thought. Still, what do you want to bet that our mystery sender has friends? I don't like to think about being outnumbered, but --"

"I could just not let you out of my sight," Dee growled.

"How will that help me if something happens to you?" Ryo demanded. "If you keep insisting that won't happen, I'll get Diana to plant another kiss on you, Mr. Always Alert."

"You are the most unromantic son of a bitch _ever_." Dee yanked up Ryo's left wrist and snapped a cuff around it.

The click sounded unnaturally loud in the room; Dee exhaled angrily as he pushed Ryo and himself onto their feet.

"Gonna fight me?" he said, almost hopefully.

"No," Ryo said. "Let's say I already fought back. I'm drugged or at gunpoint. That's how someone who isn't you would get cuffs on me in the first place."

"I'm really not liking how much you've thought about this," Dee said, steering him into the hallway.

Ryo said, "You're always hassling me about my non-existent guard. This is me not getting defensive about it, for a change."

They'd reached the entrance of Ryo's bathroom. Dee jerked his head toward the toilet as he said, his voice rough, "So. You're gonna let me strip you, clean you out, and then shove anything else I want up your hole? I'll be right here in this room with you, and I'll be looking at everything that comes out of you -- every last little clump and clot of shit you've never wanted me to see -- and you won't be able to make me go away or turn my head or find something else to do. You don't even like it when I see you blow your nose, so how are you going to sit on that can in front of me and not have a stroke?"

As he spoke, Dee watched the color drain out of Ryo's face, his lover's dark eyes widening in dismay. _I knew it_, Dee thought. _Your imagination's not shabby, partner, but I can out-deprave you any day of the week._ Dee tightened his embrace and continued, "Tell me to stop, Ryo. Please. Now. I couldn't take it if you ended up hating me for this. You don't have to prove that you'd let me do anything to you."

Ryo's throat was so dry that it took him several tries before he could force out, "This never crossed my mind."

Dee would have ordinarily rejoiced in the concession, but he too was trembling. "Aren't you glad I'm not your enemy?"

Ryo nodded, still looking more than a little ill. "Very, very glad."

"Good," Dee said, reaching toward the handcuff case on Ryo's belt.

Before he could extract the key from it, however, Ryo twisted away. "No," he said, stumbling ahead into the bathroom. "We need to do this."


	4. Chapter 4

With a loud oath, Dee lunged forward, catching hold of Ryo just in time: an instant later, Ryo's head would have collided with the opposite wall.

"Asshole," Dee hissed. "Can you _try_ to work on the part about _not_ getting hurt?"

"Thanks," Ryo said, with a shaky laugh. "Sure. I'll save the self-concussions for when things get really dire."

"_Goddammit!_" Dee sank his fingers even deeper into Ryo's arms. "That's not how things fucking work! If they get that bad, you won't be able to move your head at all, let alone smash it on anything!"

"That was a joke," Ryo said, looking vexed at Dee's belaboring of the obvious. "I don't plan to give our mystery pal any help on having his way with me. Anyway, he won't get this far unless he's already given me a concussion, so I'll be doing my best to stay awake."

"Can't we just work on that instead?" Dee didn't try to mask the desperation in his voice. "You, me, back to the living room, shove the furniture to the side--"

"You're forgetting the point." Dee felt Ryo's arms flex outward, against the death grip he had on them.

He immediately loosened his fingers. "Oh, shit, I left marks--"

"Yeah, you did. Don't worry about it." Ryo managed a slight smile. "I can hold onto the way you hold onto me."

"Un-friggin'-real. If I had known that's what it'd take to get you to say something that romantic--"

"Right," Ryo said, his lips twitching upwards. "Dare you to try that again."

"When you're expecting it?" Dee shook his head. "Even if I had both your hands cuffed, that'd just be begging to get clobbered."

"See?" Ryo's smile widened. "My ability to defend myself is so totally not the issue here."

Dee opened his mouth to protest -- and then shut it, defeated. "Fuck," he muttered, scrubbing at his face with his hand. "Yeah. I hate it when you're right. No, wait, I don't hate you being right. Shit. I can't even talk about this right -- this whole situation _sucks_."

"We could start with that, if you want," Ryo suggested, adopting his helpful-to-the-public voice. "If I have to go down on anyone with my hands cuffed, I'll be happier if you're my first."

"I'll be happiest as your _only_," Dee growled.

"Well, that would make me happiest too," Ryo said, patiently. "But just in case we don't get a choice--"

Dee spun Ryo around, silencing his partner with a deep, soul-stealing kiss. When he finally broke away for air, he sighed. "Maybe later, okay? Beautiful as you are, downstairs wants no part of this at all."

It was rare for a kiss like that to leave him unaroused. Ryo dropped his head onto Dee's shoulder. "So what should we do to get downstairs to cooperate?"

"Nothing, at the moment." Dee glared down at the cuffs dangling from Ryo's left wrist. With another angry exhalation, he pulled them around Ryo's back and joined them to Ryo's right wrist. As he began to undo Ryo's trousers, he said, "This is about things being done to you, not me." His voice harsh, he continued, "First let's see just how much you can take. No sense waking up my dick if things don't get that far."

Ryo stepped out of the trousers and underwear obediently enough, but his eyes flashed fire. "Then get on with those things already, so we can set you straight on what I can handle."

"Christ!" Dee flung Ryo's clothes out into the hall and yanked open a cabinet door. "You get offended at the craziest things!" He reached in and pulled out a brown bucket.

"Well, that answers one question," Ryo said. "I've always wondered how much snooping was going on in here."

Dee retorted, "You seriously think our guests don't go peeking into your drawers?"

"Just like at work," Ryo agreed, his tone peculiarly neutral. Dee shot him a funny look, but then returned to the bucket, removing a stack of washcloths and then lifting out a smaller bucket. Ryo continued, "Of course they might look, but knowing about things like second pails? That takes determination."

"I'm a determined kind of guy," Dee said, flatly. "There'd be no living with you if I wasn't."

"True," Ryo conceded. "So, since you seem to know where things are, how do you want me?"

Dee had picked up the black enema syringe. Frowning at it, he said, "How do you usually work with this? Fill up in the tub, then move to the can when you're ready?"

"Something like that," Ryo said. "I fill the pail first, then fill the bulb from that, and then fill me."

"Until you're done with all the water in the pail?"

"Or until I'm clean. Sometimes I don't need all the water."

"But sometimes you do?" Dee looked from the tub to the commode. "That's a lot of trips."

Ryo admitted, "Most of the time I take care of all of it over the toilet."

"Which you can do when your hands aren't chained? Huh. Maybe I should uncuff you -- make you clean yourself out while I watch. You'd hate that enough, wouldn't you?

"Slacker," Ryo said. "Do you ever stop trying to get out of doing the dirty work?"

"You are so unfair! After all your bitching about --"

"Surely," Ryo said, "a smart, determined guy like you can think around a little pair of cuffs."

Dee glared at Ryo. "It would serve you right if I made you use this bucket as a Port-a-potty."

Ryo made a face at the idea -- but then he said, "Fine."

"_Fine_!?"

"Yeah, it's fine. It's just a pail. We can always throw it out when we're done. Or donate it to the building the next time there's a leak." Ryo paused, and a truly evil gleam appeared in his eye. "Or offer it to JJ as a wine bucket."

Dee stared at his lover. "Was he egging Santiago on today? He must have done something to put himself back at the top of your shit list--" Dee broke off as Ryo suddenly threw back his head, peals of laughter escaping him. "What is the matter with you?"

" 'Shit list'! I've never heard it used so literally!"

Dee mentally reviewed what he'd said, and then he grinned. "Well. If the idea amuses you so . . ." He stood up and steered Ryo onto the seat of the toilet. He then returned to the buckets, moving all the paraphernalia he had removed from them onto the counter before placing both containers in the bathtub, with the smaller pail closer to the faucet.

He turned on the water. As they waited for it to warm up, Ryo said, "I wouldn't really do that to JJ, you know. Because he'd share the wine with Drake, and Drake hasn't done anything wrong."

"So we save it for the next time Drake and JJ have a fight."

"We are _not_ explaining to Drake why we used a bucket as a chamber pot."

"We don't have to tell him all of the truth. We just tell him we had a plumbing crisis."

Ryo pursed his lips. "I'm starting to regret the idea. If you like it that much there's got to be something wrong with it."

"Really?" Dee shut off the water. "So if I start to pretend like I'm actually into this--"

Ryo snorted. "How often do I really buy your acting skills these days?"

"You do when it suits you," Dee said. "What I can't believe is that you still think this is a good idea."

"Then I guess _my_ acting has gotten better over the years," Ryo said, the faint smile back on his lips. "Go me."

Dee's lips twisted. "Well, we're pretty much at that point, I guess." When Ryo looked confused, Dee threw him an exasperated look. "As long as you're sitting there. Anything you want to leak or dump without me helping it along, now's the time."

"Oh." Ryo turned scarlet. He sat silent for a moment. Then he bit his lip and said, "Might be a minute. Or five."

Dee stood up and leaned against the corner of the shower-faucet wall, arms folded. "Take your time. Deep breaths and all that. I'd rather not end up explaining to the EMTs how you ended up giving yourself a stroke."

"Agreed," Ryo said.

A minute elapsed. Then another. Dee kept his eyes trained on Ryo. Ryo fixedly stared at the shower-curtain rod.

Waiting had never been one of Dee's strong points. "Still trying?" he asked.

Ryo grimaced. "I will never, ever, _ever_ complain about traffic duty again."

"You mean, about dealing with shit that doesn't move fast enough?"

"Exactly." Their eyes met.

In spite of themselves, they both sniggered at the same time. Seconds later, Ryo's bowels finally cooperated, and several "plops" were heard hitting the water in the bowl.

At the noise, the flush on Ryo's face deepened to an even darker red. Dee couldn't remember when his lover had last looked so mortified; it was a shade he associated with the really old days, back when Bikky had been practically a regular down at juvie, each venture into crime sending Ryo into a state of demonic fury.

Ryo had usually gotten it out of his system by giving Bikky what-for, often in the form of several well-calibrated bops on the head with a fist. But Ryo's hands were behind his back now, cuffed and incapable of providing any defense, never mind punishment. As Ryo had already pointed out, for someone to get this far with him, they'd have to catch him in a bad state. One where he couldn't fight off the cuffs or anything else they wanted to do to him.

Dee failed to repress a shudder as he considered some of the ways someone up to no good could incapacitate his Ryo. Ryo had returned to staring at the shower-curtain rod, but at the sound of Dee's distress, he turned his head back toward his lover.

Ryo's face was still an alarming red, but his voice was cool -- almost taunting, in fact. "Too much for _you_ to handle?"

Dee flinched, but he had to hand it to Ryo: traitorous blushing aside, his lover wasn't letting on how much this had to be bothering him. It was exactly what Dee would be praying for if someone succeeded in kidnapping his Ryo: Defiance. Pride. Calm.

Striving to match Ryo's tone, Dee said, "Can I get you a glass of water? Or a stiff drink?"

Ryo said, almost sneering, "Trying to make me feel at home?" Something must have flashed across Dee's face at that, however -- a hint of hurt, or of desolation -- for Ryo suddenly reverted back to true Ryo-ness, sounding both contrite and concerned. "Dee. Dee, Dee, Dee, I love you so much. Honest to God, I know you're just looking out for me." Looking rueful, Ryo added, "If we were going for making this more real, you probably _should_ try to drug me."

"Yeah, but then you'd be _too_ relaxed. Sort of misses the whole point of this if you're too out of it to mind."

Ryo said, slowly, "I may regret telling you this, but you know how, at the dentist, laughing gas is supposed to make everything okay?"

Dee nodded curtly, bracing himself.

Ryo continued, "It does its work, on the surface. My gums don't hurt while she's digging at them, and my reflexes turn into pudding. But it also completely sends my adrenalin through the roof, you know? Giving up control like that, even when I'm supposed to -- even when I absolutely have to, for her to do her work -- it's like an instant panic attack. Kinda like you when you're stuck anywhere without your gun."

"This is why you can't make me go to the dentist. I'm totally not sitting anywhere near sharp objects without my gun on my hip."

"And you call _me_ a control freak?"

"Babe, I'm not even in your league. You're the one going out of your way to freak yourself out now so that you don't freak out later."

"If it makes you feel any better," Ryo offered, "I'm feeling better about what could happen."

Dee studied Ryo's face for a long moment. Then he said, "Be back in a few," and abruptly left the bathroom.

~ ~ ~ 

 

It was more than a few minutes before Dee returned. Ryo had heard the opening and shutting of assorted kitchen drawers and cabinet doors, as well as the footsteps of Dee's trips to and from what sounded like Bikky's room.

Ryo grimaced: Dee really did know him too well. Sex on his son's bed? That was going to make things skin-crawlingly awkward the next time Bikky came home, even though the kid no longer regularly occupied said bed, and even if they never told the kid that they had borrowed it for kinky diversions.

And Dee knew him well enough to know that he would already be tying himself into knots over all the possible consequences, even though they might not even get to the room itself, and even though Bikky probably already assumed they were doing gross things on his bed when he wasn't around. After all, Dee had never been shy about pouncing on Ryo everywhere else in the apartment.

Everywhere other than this room, until now. Ryo wriggled his wrists inside the cuffs. He was starting to feel chilly and cramped, and his body had evacuated everything it was going to on its own. It was past time for Dee to be back--

As Ryo teetered on the edge between fretting and fuming, Dee stalked back into the bathroom, tumbler of whisky in hand.

"Drink," he said roughly, not giving Ryo a chance to reply before pressing the glass to Ryo's mouth.

Ryo automatically parted his lips and tilted his head back, letting Dee pour the liquid down his throat. As he did so, his thoughts wildly flitted from _He's forcing me. . ._ to _He's forcing himself to force me. . ._ to _Hello panic, my old friend. . ._ to _Dee's doing this to me first. No one will be able to take that from me. **Yes**_.

The glass went away, Dee replacing it with his own mouth. The whirl of frantic thoughts whooshed straight out of Ryo's head as the kiss went on and on. _Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. . ._

Ending the kiss, Dee hauled in a huge breath. His gaze on Ryo was unsettlingly like that of a questionably sane artist admiring a masterpiece in progress. "If anyone else _ever_ gets to see you like that," he said, "there won't be anything left of them to lock up. Not when I'm done with them."

Ryo husked out, "If anyone sees me like this, they'll know I'm thinking of you. And I really, really, really want you to behave if any of this comes to pass. As much as you'd enjoy beating the shit out of them, I'll feel much better if you're around for whatever's left of _me_."

"Oh for fuck's sake!" Looking like he desperately needed to smash something, Dee sagged into Ryo, hands sliding down Ryo's arms in parallel with his head nuzzling its way down Ryo's chest.

But when he reached Ryo's belly, Dee drew back in surprise, his eyes round as he stared at Ryo's groin. "I can't believe you're hard from this."

"Force of habit," Ryo muttered. "When I clean myself out, it's always before we're about to have sex, y'know?"

"Well," Dee said, suddenly way more cheerful, "far be it from me to disrupt your wholesome habits."

"Dee!" Ryo protested, but Dee had already sealed his mouth around the erection. Ryo was even more shocked when it took less than a minute -- a couple hard sucks, a flutter, a lick -- for him to explode in Dee's mouth.

He would have bet all the money in the world on it taking longer. His hands cuffed, his ass not even wiped -- it wasn't natural. It wasn't him. It _should_ have taken longer.

"For someone who just came," Dee said dryly, "you look massively unhappy."

Ryo could feel his cheeks heating up again. "It was amazing," he said. "You're amazing. It's not your fault I think too much."

"Damn right you do." Dee pressed his forehead against Ryo's. "But as long as I'm somewhere in those thoughts. . ."

"Oh yes," Ryo assured him. "You and only you, forever."

"Well, then." Dee reached over to the toilet paper holder and tore off a couple squares. "Let's wipe you down and rinse you out, and then we'll see if we can't persuade that brain of yours to take a break."

~ ~ ~ 

 

Ryo stared at the weight bench in Bikky's room. Dee had covered it with several beach towels, and pushed a folding chair against the end closer to the door, sideways, draping its seat with a towel as well. The floor underneath the chair was covered with a large towel as well. Nearby, Dee had set a stack of kitchen towels, a tub of Crisco, and a bottle of vegetable oil.

Ryo swallowed, and tried for a joke. "So where's the whip, the flour, and the gang of beer bottles?"

Dee rewarded him with a tight smile. "You think my hand won't be enough for you?"

Ryo jerked his head at the Crisco and oil. "You need all that for just your hand?"

Dee said, "If you're going to let my whole hand into you, yes."

Ryo became very still, his eyes huge and scared as he re-assessed the scene with Dee's plan in mind. The bench. Him on the bench. Him flat on his back, open to Dee -- Dee, whose hands were neither small nor soft.

But they were extremely talented hands, and over the years, Dee's fingers had stroked and pinched and plucked from him sensations he hadn't known he could feel -- sensations he hadn't known it was possible to feel. Ryo loved Dee's hands on him. He loved the feeling of being cared for. Even the enemas he'd just endured -- the actual ordeal hadn't been anywhere as horrible or humiliating as he'd feared. It was Dee tending to him the way Dee might have to take care of him if his luck ran out for good.

It was reassuring to know for sure that Dee could handle it, even though Ryo had been just as glad to avoid the issue during his earlier extended leave from the precinct: during the first phase of his recovery, Ryo had been too weak and too heavily medicated to notice who was helping him with his ablutions, and following through with the rest of the case had kept Dee far too occupied to play nursemaid. By the time Ryo was released from the hospital, he had been able to tend to himself where bathroom matters were concerned; without being asked, Dee had covered all the shopping, cooking, and cleaning until Ryo had regained enough stamina and strength to insist on things being done _his_ way once more.

His enforced stay on the sidelines hadn't been wholly devoid of enjoyment. Dee was staggeringly competent when he wanted to be, and Ryo had sometimes allowed himself the simple delight of studying his partner's hands in motion. It was a self-indulgence that never would have occurred to him when healthy: there was always, always too much to do, and when he wasn't busy with that, he was either fending off Dee's roving hands or succumbing to their wicked ministrations.

As physical as they both were, they had rarely merely held each other's hands. But that had been all Ryo could manage during the first month of his recovery, and he had taken so much comfort from the size, strength, and warmth of Dee's hand as it cradled his. But to have that whole hand plunged into him? Ryo was still trying to wrap his head around the reality of their evening so far -- of his taking enema after enema from Dee without passing out from sheer humiliation. Dee's hands had felt _enormous_ on him as they spread and held him open and inserted the nozzle--

Dee had moved behind him, closing a hand around his left wrist. Ryo heard the scrape of a key within one of the locks, and then the rasp of the cuff being pulled open.

Dee lifted the freed hand to his lips, lingering over each knuckle before he lifted his gaze back to Ryo's. "It was just an idea. I'd be just as happy going to _our_ bed, ditching the props, and having some super-ordinary sex."

Ryo rubbed his knuckles against Dee's cheek, caressing. "And if I vote for staying here?"

Dee closed his eyes briefly and muttered, "God give me strength."

Re-opening his eyes, Dee searched Ryo's face as he said, "You keep not freaking out when I expect you to. Don't tell me you've actually thought of this?"

"I hadn't," Ryo admitted. "It never struck me as something we'd want to try."

"I wouldn't have bet on you even having heard of it."

Ryo flushed. "You know that bundle of books JJ and Drake gave me last year? The one with _Sex for Homos 102_, _Dizzy in Dungeons_, and _Bondage for the Bourgeois_?"

"Of course I do. Not too shabby for a gag gift. You were redder than Santa's suit after you opened that box."

"Yeah, well, I still don't like what they were getting at," Ryo said. "But I did skim through those books."

"Did you now." Dee caught hold of Ryo's wrist. "So, this -- have I stumbled into one of your fantasies?"

"No," Ryo said. "Way too unrealistic. You don't have the patience and I can't stand that kind of mess."

Dee wrapped his other hand around Ryo's other wrist, just above where the handcuffs still dangled from it. His voice low and tense, he spoke into Ryo's ear. "No one else would be worth me being that patient." He inched them a step closer to the bench. "We've survived me deep-cleaning your ass, and this will be _far_ less filthy."

~ ~ ~

 

Dee gently guided Ryo into the chair, seating him so that his legs faced the door, the back of the chair on Ryo's right. "Lean against my hands," Dee murmured; as Ryo obeyed, he lowered Ryo's upper body to the surface of the weight bench. Crawling underneath the bench, he drew Ryo's wrists together. After a deep breath, he shackled them together once more.

Standing up, he stepped back a foot to look over his handiwork: his Ryo, gorgeous and naked and at his mercy. The bench was heavy and immovable, such that Ryo could buck and roll and strain to escape it without it budging an inch. His ass was supported by the chair for the moment, but once his legs were draped over Dee's shoulders, Dee would shove it away. Ryo would have to surrender to gravity and to Dee -- to there being nothing holding him away from the floor except whatever Dee chose to provide.

Ryo was breathing hard and fast -- not quite openly panicked, but definitely signaling how out of his depth he felt. Dee knelt down by Ryo's side, placing one arm across his lover's chest and the other one above his head. He started to brush his lips over Ryo's face and neck, applying the same light soothing circles he'd used on Ryo's hand when they'd first entered the room. As Ryo's breathing returned to something closer to normal, Dee began to steal small kisses, savoring each taste of Ryo's mouth as he incrementally demanded more from it. His left hand slid down to his jeans, undoing the button and zipper holding them closed.

As Dee drew away and stood up, Ryo said, almost plaintively, "Why are you stopping?"

Dee hoped he sounded jauntier than he felt. "Who said anything about stopping?" He quickly tugged off the jeans and underwear, and then swung a leg over the bench in order to straddle Ryo's chest.

"Oh!" Ryo sounded startled, and then pleased. "Finally enjoying ourselves, are we?"

Dee shuffled forward so that the tip of his cock bumped into Ryo's chin. "I still don't like the fucking cuffs, but there's something about you not getting away from me. . ."

"Ah," Ryo said. "I've heard that power turns some people on. I can't imagine why you hate being told you're like the Commi --"

"Oh my God, shut _up_!" Dee pushed his cock into Ryo's ready mouth.

His partner really did have a warped sense of humor. That was a definite smirk on the face servicing his cock, and oh, that made him even harder: he loved it when Ryo let his wicked streak out to play, even when it was sometimes at his expense. He loved the crinkles of amusement around Ryo's eyes as his mouth massaged Dee's length; he loved that, of all things, giving Dee head was calming Ryo down even more -- that it was now for Ryo a familiar and comfortable, comforting act.

Oh, it felt so good. Too good. If he let Ryo take him all the way--

"_Now_ why are you pulling away?" Ryo complained. A hint of uncertainty crept into his eyes. "Was I doing something wrong? It's different, with my arms behind--"

"No, no," Dee reassured him, kissing and licking his way back to the end of the bench. As he reached the chair, he pushed himself up and off, bringing his left leg back over to join his right and standing up. Then he circled around to the front of the setup, crouching down and lifting Ryo's legs to his shoulders.

"Still okay?" he asked.

"Yeah," Ryo said. "It's strange, but okay."

Dee slathered his right hand with the Crisco, nibbling at the inside of Ryo's left thigh as he prepared his fingers. He thought he could hear Ryo's breath speeding up again, but it wasn't the shallow, panic-laced panting from earlier; it was much closer to the way Ryo usually sounded when Dee was about to stretch him -- the quickening of anticipation, like the way they walked faster the closer they got to a scene, a stadium. . .

One finger. Two. This was standard procedure for them, in spite of the damn cuffs, and Dee had to admit -- just to himself -- that it did add a touch of spice, this new-to-him angle from which he was pressing his fingers into Ryo. He was never going to get enough of his partner's body, not even if Ryo ever caved in and agreed to Dee's dream week at the shore: just them, no clothes, and no phones -- no interruptions whatsoever.

It will never happen. When he's not, say, deranged with grief, or chasing a lead that even Dee thinks he shouldn't, Ryo's far too responsible to cut off contact from the rest of the world. And even if he were to lose his mind long enough to agree to it, for the sake of humoring Dee, Ryo wouldn't be able to stem the compulsive second thoughts and subsequent backup plans that would follow such a move, and that would totally kill the whole carefree hell-with-the-world point of getting away from the crowd to begin with.

Dee shook his head, shooing the fantasy back into the shadows. He had Ryo in front of him, willingly captive, a feast unbelievably all for him and only for him. He carefully began to slide a third finger into Ryo's hole. They'd gotten this far before, but usually with a lot less lubrication and a lot more urgency: in spite of his prim, by-the-book approach to every other area of their lives, there was seldom anything reserved or orderly about Ryo once they reached this point. Ryo could be slow to arousal -- the disparity in their sex drives had triggered more than a couple fights during their first year together -- but once his hormones were kindled, Ryo was as eager as any other man Dee had ever met to rush toward feeling good as fast and hard as possible.

But Dee couldn't go any faster with this, not if he wanted to do it right -- to free Ryo from his mind's incessant churning _and_ bring him back intact. To push Ryo past his limits and still be loved. As he scooped up some more shortening with his free hand, Dee thought to himself that people who did this with strangers had to be _crazy_. He couldn't imagine taking this much time and care with someone he hadn't gotten to know, really _know_, over months -- years. He couldn't picture doing this right without having learned how to tell "Fuck!" (_ouch, you son of a bitch_) from "Fuck!" (_that feels incredible, give me more, NOW_) from "Fuck. . ." (_what was that, I don't know how I feel about it yet_).

Maybe some people just had a knack for decoding intimate gibberish right off the bat, the way some freaks picked up Spanish or Polish within seconds of chatting with someone's grandmother. Dee took considerable pride in being a quick study about most things -- it was what let him get away with slacking off on chores and assignments he found boring -- but mastering foreign languages wasn't among them. But he couldn't get enough of learning _Ryo_, and it had taken a long time to become even remotely fluent in making sense of the man: as much as he ribbed Ryo for being an easy read, the fact was that Ryo was deep and complicated enough to keep surprising him. To keep him spellbound, savoring the cadences of Ryo's curses and whimpers and knowing that he was the one drawing them forth.

~ ~ ~ 

 

Ryo had never been penetrated by anything wider than Dee's three fingers. Even with infinitesimally attentive stretching and copious quantities of Crisco, his channel was not immediately welcoming the fourth finger Dee had slowly worked into it.

The handcuffs were making it easier: not having to wonder about where his hands ought to be was turning out to be a relief. His mind kept flashing back to the first time they had _really_ slept together. That night, they'd gone to his old apartment: he hadn't been handcuffed, he'd been on all fours, and there had been absolutely zero finesse in Dee's rough and hasty prep before fucking him.

This wasn't like that at all, and yet, Ryo felt as if he was reliving how that night had changed him: the thrill and discomfort of Dee's fingers invading him was dominating his consciousness, leaving little room for his chronic self-second-guessing. _That_ was like that first time: he wasn't fretting overmuch about how he didn't know what he was doing, or whether he was responding the way he should, or how on earth he was going to reciprocate later.

Dee had displayed possessiveness from the very beginning, long before Ryo had even considered him a friend, never mind a plausible partner for life, but this slow, excruciatingly careful claiming of Ryo was nonetheless new territory. Dee's usual m.o. with Ryo tended to fall more along the lines of gleeful ambush, outright molestation, or blunt demands, all so very _Dee_ that Ryo had never expected anything else.

That Dee's fingers were crooking and curving against every millimeter they traveled across was not a surprise; it was the time and concentration that Dee was lavishing on making sure he could take them in. It was making Ryo's heart race twice as fast than a hard, quick screw would have done, even as slow tears leaked from his eyes.

He could sense that, upon seeing those tears, Dee had nearly called a halt to the night. But his lover had then simply asked, "Like Christmas, is it?"

Ryo had breathed out a "Yes!", and after another beat, Dee had resumed the rocking of his fingers inside Ryo's ass. There wasn't any space between the fingers and the walls of muscle surrounding them; the rocking was more of a sustained hint of motion than a true back-and-forth. It was like earlier in the evening, when Ryo had tested his arms against Dee's grip on them: slight as it was, the rocking was doing its job, coaxing the newly-stretched muscles to accept all four fingers.

It was only when Dee paused to pour some of the oil onto his hand that Ryo became aware of the chair no longer being under him: at some point, Dee had indeed pushed it out of the way. Its disappearance gave Dee unrestricted access to Ryo's ass, since there was now nothing to block his hands from any angle they wanted to take.

Ryo had glimpsed at least two photographs of body slings in the books from JJ and Drake. At the time, he'd internally recoiled at the notion of being suspended like that. To be unable to move, his ass exposed to any passing predator -- that was the stuff of nightmares, not sexual gratification. Yet here he was, his body anchored by the weight-bench and Dee, Dee blowing lightly across his buttocks as if to underscore their unguarded state. That there was nothing now protecting him -- nothing between his entrance and any would-be marauder except Dee.

Dee's entire hand was now striving to assert possession, thumb tucked securely underneath the four fingers. The tip of the thumb wasn't a problem at all, but the way its lower knuckle jutted out from the rest of the hand -- even with Dee's other hand massaging all around the rim, trying to spread it wider as his fist tested angle after angle -- it wasn't happening, and Ryo felt tears of true frustration starting to prick his eyes.

Then Dee said, imploring, "You've trusted me this far. Let me in, Ryo. Let me feel what it's like for you to own my hand."

Ryo felt his body all but melt at the words, and with it the resistance to Dee's insistent press into his body. Ryo gasped as his entrance closed around Dee's wrist, Dee's fist huge within him like a knot of coals.

It was terrifying. It was exquisite. Dee murmured, "Easy there. I'm not doing anything yet."

"You don't have to," Ryo panted. "I can't. . . I can't. . . ohhhh!" He felt Dee's gaze on him as the first spasm overtook him, his body surrendering to the sheer presence of the hand it now surrounded. He felt as if every nerve ending within him had been suddenly magnified a hundredfold, each unleashing a shower of sparks into his blood as the heat from Dee's fist spread through his body and ignited them.

The notion of simply resting against Dee's hand was utterly ludicrous. His flesh yearned to escape it, but each stretch of his muscles away from the intrusion shifted new crevices and folds against the bulk, flooding him with a fresh wave of pleasure before he'd recovered from the previous one.

Through the haze of simultaneous discomfort and bliss, he heard Dee say, "God, you're so fucking _gorgeous_. And such a gorgeous fuck." His lover's voice was rough with awe. Ryo didn't need to open his eyes to sense Dee's lips curving upwards as he continued, "Let's see where I can take you to."

"Aaaaahh!" Ryo strained against his bonds, writhing as Dee deliberately began to rub his fist against Ryo's interior walls. Each movement was microscopic -- a minute twist to the left, a slight tug to the south, a slow clench and release -- but each one rocked through Ryo with the force of a size 7 earthquake.

It was like being kissed until he couldn't stand up, over and over. Ryo had thought he had known what fire was, but this was being consumed alive with his own body as its pyre. This wasn't going to calm him down the way sex normally did -- he wasn't going to survive it, period. His body couldn't possibly contain all the heat racing through his veins; his lungs couldn't possibly draw in enough air; his bones felt as light as threads of ashes.

And yet, and yet -- he heard himself gasp out, "More, Dee. I want you to. You won't hurt me. _Please_, Dee." He heard his lover's sharp intake of breath, and then he felt -- ohhhhh. Dee's fist ground into him, possessive and conquering, sending Ryo even deeper into the waves of overwhelming sensation.

He was past caring about the fact that he was now howling with abandon, unable to respond in any other way to the pain-tinged pleasure Dee was inflicting upon him. "Is this what you were after, Ryo?" Dee rasped out. There was both pride and desperation in his voice as he demanded, "Is this what you'll keep with you?"

Ryo's reasons for propelling Dee and himself into using the handcuffs had completely evaporated from his mind. His body was shaking so hard that he couldn't steady himself enough to nod, but he managed to whisper, "Every... you're my everything, Dee. You... only you..."

"Dear God," Dee choked out. "There is _no way_ I'm ever letting you go."

With no breath to spare for more speech, Ryo mouthed, "There...there was, before?"

"Of course not," Dee said, a note of reluctant satisfaction in his voice. "Not gonna stop me from reminding you." He tilted his head so that his mouth could fasten onto a succulent spot just inside the curve of Ryo's right thigh. As he began to suck, his free hand wrapped itself around Ryo's cock, which had risen to attention as Dee complied with Ryo's plea for "more."

"_Dee_!" Ryo cried out, his legs and hips bucking hard in response to the new jolts of stimulation from Dee's lips and hand. His body pulsed around the fist still buried within it as Dee ruthlessly stroked him, the hand inside and the hand on his cock both caressing him towards total capitulation. Ryo was flying, his entire world a blur of lightning and heat and Dee -- Dee was the sky and the sea and the sun, and Ryo couldn't bear it, this marvelous agony of almost touching the sun. He was going to drown in Dee -- there was going to be nothing left of him --

"I love you," he heard Dee say, the words raw with need. "I love how strong and stubborn you are. I love how much of you is only for me. How much of it no one else will ever, ever see. _You own me,_ Ryo. I couldn't do this for anyone else." Ryo moaned incoherently -- he was so exhausted, and yet so close to the edge -- and Dee's voice deepened. "I won't ever let you go. Come for me, Ryo. Don't hold anything back. Let me catch you. Let me hold you. I'm _yours_, Ryo--"

The words sent Ryo spinning into his release, his ejaculate flowing out of him as his fears relinquished their last, tenacious grip on his consciousness. As he trembled and groaned through the orgasm, Dee chanted "I love you" and "yes" and "yours" over and over.

~ ~ ~

 

Throughout the rest of the night, Dee didn't dare leave Ryo alone for even a second. His eyes never left his partner as he eased his hand back out, and he hungrily lapped at Ryo's navel and ribs as he brought himself to his own climax, savoring the way Ryo quivered beneath him. He promised himself that he would make Ryo look like that again: Ryo wore the expression of a man not only thoroughly sated, but happily stunned at finding himself besieged with yet more pleasure. It was a very, very good look on him, but Dee wanted to earn it without the help of the goddamn handcuffs.

As he carried Ryo to bed, Dee knew he could congratulate himself on an exceptional performance, all the way through the cleaning-up. After unlocking the cuffs and _finally_ getting to hurl them aside, he had helped Ryo back to the bathroom, Ryo drowsily snuggling against him as Dee soaped and sponged away the grease and semen and tears. Within seconds of Dee tucking him under the covers, Ryo fell fast asleep.

Dee switched off the light and climbed in on the other side, but instead of lying down straight away, he propped himself up on an elbow, resting his head against the fist he hadn't used and gazing at Ryo with a grim, tight-mouthed tenderness. The moonlight streaming in through the window accentuated the almost preternatural elegance of Ryo's features: The hollows of the neck and ears. The high cheekbones. The mouth that had called his name again and again without once begging him to stop.

Tamping down the urge to clutch, to shake, to berate, Dee pressed his lips against his lover's hair. "You and your damn secrets," he quietly said. "I know there's more to all this than you're telling me."


End file.
